The rescue of France

DC 323
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Copy 1

The Rescue of France.

A DISCOURSE

SPOKEN BEFORE A MEETING OP FRENCH GENTLEMEN, IN
PHILADELPniA, AT THE

ASSEMBLY BUILDINGS

Mnrc7i 7/?t, JS72,

^y KEV. C MIEL.

TRANSLATED BY EDWARD ROTH.

PHILADELPHIA:
KING & BAIRD, PRINTERS, 607 AND 609 SANSOM STREET.
1872.

The Rescue of France.

A DISCOURSE

SPOKEN BEFORE A MEETING OP FRENCH GENTtiEMEN, IN
PniLADELPHIA, AT THE

ASSEMBLY BUILDINGS,
March 7th, /872,

By BEV. O. MIEL.

TRANSLATED BY EDWARD ROTH.

PHILADELPHIA:
KING & BAIRD, PRINTERS, 607 AND 009 SANSOM STREET.

1872.

Whilst reading in the original the following eloquent and
ioucliing discourse (not with dry eyes it must be confessed), the
idea .occurred to the translator, of performing his little part in a
great act of charity by laying before the American people — the
generous nation par excellence — an affecting appeal which,
though exclusively intended for natives of France, cannot but
arouse the sympathy of every humane breast.

Words cannot describe the present sufferings of France, the
kindly, the genial, the high spirited, "whom we all love so
well," once our faithful and fast friend (in the gloomy days
when fast and faithful friends were few indeed), once so
glorious and happy, but now writhing under the heel of a
foreign master and suffering such afflictions in consequence
that even a stranger to her soil and blood cannot help con-
tributing his small mite towards bringing them to the earliest
possible termination.

Our German brethren must not misunderstand us ; had they
been overwhelmed by similar misfortunes, they too should be
entitled to our active sympathy, and would receive it !

Messrs. King «& Baird, with their well known liberality, have
generously offered to bear half the expense of this edition.

EDWARD ROTH.

Bboad Street Academy,

Phila., April 3, 1873.

^^ ADDRESS.

Gentlemen : — .^ bunclred and fifty years ago,
France, invaded by tlie English, a prey to internal dis-
sensions, was threatened with slavery and ruin ; the
world believed that our lovely country was about to
disappear forever, and with it, civilization. King,
Church, Nobility, the only powers then existing, were
plunged in despair. But in the midst of this universal
despondence, it came to pass that one young girl had
the faith ! A peasant of the Meuse valley, meeting
her one evening on the road near her village, told
her what misfortunes had befallen her coantr3\
" Well !" she cried, her countenance blazing with
inspiration, " there is a poor shepherdess now living
who shall deliver this kingdom before a year is
over !" And, in fact, shortly after, Joan of Arc
starts on her mission of deliverance. Through what
trials, through wliat dangers, she had to pass, before
accomplishing her task, God alone knows. But the
day at last comes when we behold her advancing,
like some celestial visitant, mounted on a black
charger, glittering in snow white armor, in one hand
her sword, in the other the oriflamme ! The people
fall on their knees as she moves before them ! All

at ouee, quick as lightning, she rushes to the charge,
terrible, but at the same time merciful. With one
gesture she levels fortresses, with another she
sweeps away armies. The English, astounded, over-
whelmed, retire in discomfiture. France is saved,
and it is the faith of a peasant girl of Lorraine that
has wrought the miracle !

I need not, gentlemen, point you out the melan-
choly analogy existing between the present state of
our beloved France and that to which I have just
alluded. I need not remind you of her purest blood
shed in torrents, her treasures robbed, her fairest
provinces ravaged, a portion of her territory still
trampled on by the enemy's heel, and, to crown her
woes, a number of her children abandoning them-
selves to a blind and accursed party spirit, and fighting
desperately over the little spoil still left to their un-
happy mother. " Oh God I save us or we perish !"
is the instinctive cry now resounding through the
length and the breadth of the land, the only cry uttered
by all who have the welfare of their country really
at heart. And this last cry has been heard ! God
will save France ! Not by the ordinary means — in a
situation so deplorable, ordinary means are of little
avail. God will save us ! Not by the wisdom of
our rulers, not by the valor of our soldiers, not by
the perfection of our instruments of warfare, but, as
in the fifteenth century, by miracles of faith, pa-
triotism, and love !

For, in truth, what voice is this we hear sounding
in the east, sweet enough to be called celestial, loud

enough to move the world ? It is the voice of the
humble maidens of Alsace and Lorraine, the voice
of the worthy sisters of Joan of Arc. What sublim-
ity is in their simple language !

" Mr. President^ our offering is indeed small, hut all
of us, even the poorest, have contributed our share.
Please to accept it and employ it for the ransom of
France, our beloved mother, from whose dear bosom
violence has indeed been able to tear us, but to lohom we
have devoted forever oar aspirations and our hearts.'^

At the sound of this voice what an indescribable
emotion takes possession of our souls 1 The image
of our country, a moment ago veiled in sorrow and
mourning, is transformed before our eyes : the em-
blems of grief and sufiering fall from around her,
and she rises before her children more beautiful,
noble and enchanting, than even in dreams 1 At
such a sight, these children are at once inspired with
a new love, and are ready to testify it by sacrifices
of all kinds, by sacrifices the most heroic ! Never
has the world witnessed a more sublime spectacle 1
l!Tever before has it seen patriotism purer, more self-
denying, or more courageous 1

My language, gentlemen, is strong, I am well
aware, and, even now when facts bear me out, doubt,
I know, is only natural. Accordingly, at the first
proposal of the project, it is not wonderful, that the
idea of France, so impoverished, so degenerate — as
some friends kindly intimated — being still capable of
anything so manly, so great, requiring such marvel-
lous devotion — it is not wonderful, I say, that this

idea provoked at first a smile of pity among foreign-
ers, and even found many skeptics among our own
countrymen. You can read in the Nineteenth Cen-
tury something like the following, written by M.
Sarcey, the editor : — " The very day I wrote my first
article in favor of the work, an assistant called and
said : ' I bet five francs this subscription never
reaches a million ?' I put down my five francs. Two
days after he comes and says : ' I want to win back
my money ; I now bet five francs your subscription
never reaches twenty millions.' ' Done !' cried I ;
' the city of Lille alone has pledged itself for that
sum. To give you a further chance of winning back
your money, I now bet that the subscription will
rise to a hundred millions, and if you come here in a
few days I will bet it rises to five hundred millions,
and I am bound to win my wager too.' " Yes, gen-
tlemen, most assuredly he shall win his wager.

For, the grand idea of making sacrifices without
stint or limit for our country's ransom, has taken
root everywhere, and is manifesting itself in forms^:
the most diverse and the most surprising. The
enthusiasm is universal and irresistible. From all
directions are subscriptions coming ; in all directions
are committees organizing. Churches and theatres,
colleges and workshops, the administration and the
army, all take their part in it. The soldier gives
every month one day's pay : the artisan one day's
labor. Some officials offer the tenth part of their
salary ; some deputies the whole of it. Here, the
widow of a member of the Institute writes : " I ask

no pension until the day when our dear country
shall be completely free — what more can I do?"
There, a veteran laborer writes in his turn : " I am
only an old workman, living with my poor wife on
crusts slowly and painfully collected. ISo matter,
I'm good for three hundred francs." And the noble
fellow adds : " Keep ray name private ; I give it to
you only because I consider my engagement a debt
of honor." Yes, brother, we shall respect thy gen-
erous delicacy; we shall not seek to know thy
glorious name ; let it be enough for ns to know that
it is written in the great book of Him who recom-
penses a hundred fold even a cup of cold water
given in charity !

What other examples shall I mention ? Standing
beside the merchant, who cries in his excitement:
" I will give a hundred thousand francs, two hun-
dred thousand francs, all I can !" — is a peasant
from the neighborhood of Paris, ruined by the
war, but oifering the last and only thing left to
him, his poor cow, and begging them with tears
not to refuse his sacrifice. Here again, is a young
girl bringing everything she possesses of any value,
bits of earrings and poor old jewelry, and, ashamed
of her poverty, timidly adding: "I will give an
hour's work every week besides." Perhaps it was
under the inspiration of such a touching example,
that a noble lady proposed to the women of
France to surrender all their diamonds and pearls at
once to their country, so that at the sight of a lady
wearing no jewelry, every one could say: "she must

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be French — she must belong to the Legion of Honor
of French women!"

I cannot resist the pleasure of here quoting the
admirable words employed by a Sister of Charity in
Paris, when asking to have the nuns all through
France included in the noble work of the tax of
honor. "Usually," she writes, "the Sister of Charity's
privilege is to ask; now she solicits the honor of
being allowed to give. Lot the lad}'- directors of the
committees come then and receive her mite ; and
write her name on their list between the grand dame
of fashion and the poor servant girl ; between the
Protestant minister's wife and the Jewish maiden ;
let all social classes, let all religious beliefs, unite for
once in friendly embrace to the cry of Vive la
Fi-ance r

Such, gentlemen, is this sublime emulation of
patriotism, this noble ambition ^to disenthrall our
country at the earliest possible moment, and to save
her at any cost. It has gained all hearts; it has
penetrated all conditions ; it has wiped out all divi-
sions ; it has conquered all narrow considerations of
self; and that not only within the boundaries of
France, but all over the world, wherever beneath
the breast of man, and still better, beneath the breast
of woman, a true French heart is beating!

In Italy and in Belgium, in Switzerland ever
faithful, in Ireland ever devoted, in Loudon and in
New York, from St. Petersburgh to San Francisco,
from Montreal to New Orleans, everywhere., the celes-
tial voice of our sisters of Alsace and Lorraine, has

9

found a sympathetic and responsive echo ! And
thus — 0 miracle of Divine Wisdom ! — it is by the two
daughters that she has lost that France, our mother,
shall be saved !

That she has lost ! But is it true that we liave lost
our two fixir provinces of the east? l^o doubt, our
enemies arc ruling there to-day, but they do not
reign there ! No doubt, they hold the soil with the
gripe of a master ; but there is a fortress there which
shall brave forever all the efforts of their army and
their artillery, however formidable. It is the heart !
Yes ! the heart, the great and noble heart of these
conquered provinces, still clings to France their
mother, clings to her with a desperate rapture of
fidelity that provokes the astonished admiration of
the world. Therefore, be convinced of this truth :
whoever has the heart is the master ; to whoever
possesses the heart, the possession of the rest is only
a question of time.

France shall be saved, I have already said, but is
that enough to say ? When in the eleventh centurj',
after the long lethargy of the middle ages, the
French, our ancestors, all, gentle and simple, great
lords, barons, vassals and peasants, sprang to arms
at the crj' of " God wills it !" when, abandoning
fortune, family, and country, they pressed forward
on the steps of the Frenchman, Peter the Hermit,
towards the distant Orient, what task did they pro-
pose themselves to accomplish? Simply to rescue
our Lord's sepulchre ; and they did it. But without
being aware of it, they did much more; they

10

founded the French nationality ; tliey inaugurated
a new society ; they opened the era of modern
civilization, the ever-enlarging career of freedom
and progress. Their intention had been only to
rescue the tomb of Christ ; as a reward for their
faith and sacrifices, they brought back' from the
east to the west, the spirit of Christ himself, his
spirit of light, life and wisdom !

In like manner, gentlemen, the sublime enthusiasm
now swaying France in this new solemn moment of
her history, shall not have the rescue of the national
soil for its only result. It has another and a greater
object ! The restoration, the redemption of France
herself! — of France, lately so despised, reviled, down-
trodden, but now showing herself to the world reju-
venated through suffering, radiant with ixew dignity,
and ready once more to start anew, full of hope and
love, on a brighter and more glorious career. Already
she is attracting the sympathies of the world ; already
her habitual detractors are passing visibly from sur-
prise to admiration, and, ashamed of having made
such a strange mistake, are trying to stammer forth a
timid apology. Pardon them, 0 my France — let me
say it without blasphemy — they knew not what they
were doing. Accept even, if so it must be, the part of
the Magdalen of JSTations, which they have allotted
to thee — even that is not without its glory — and full
of confidence in the words of Him who has said :
" Many sins are forgiven to her, because she has
loved much," receive once more courage into thy
heart purified by charity ; lift up once more thy poor

11

head without shame, for it is glittering with the
aureola of a martyr. Yes, 0 my country, my well
beloved — in the glowing language of one of thy
sons —

" In vain with agonizpcl heart hast thou gazed on thy cities in

ruins ;
In vain in countless heaps have thy noblest been slaughtered

around thee ;
In vain hast thou fought, void of hope, to the last 'gainst a foe

overwhelming ;
Still, never despair, O France I again thou shall rise up uncon-

quered.

" Stronger than ever thou'lt rise, the throes of thy martyrdom
ended ;

Free from the harpies despoiling, free from the rulers corrupting ;

Poor, but honest and proud ! O France, my country, what mat-
ters

One year more or less ? Thy empire shall flourish forever.

"Let them pile then thy hard earned gold in heaps on their
wagons enormous ;

On the food of thy starving poor, let them gorge their fat bodies
to bursting ;

Thy time is coming, 0 France, and the era is not very distant

When tlce land shall belong to the kindly, not to the barbarous mas-
ter/''

"Whether that shall be so, gentlemen, depends to-
day on the eftbrts of us all collectively, and of each
of us individually. Our sisters in Philadelphia, imi-
tating our sisters in Lorraine and Alsace, and our
sisters throughout the length and breadth of France,
invoke our co-operation in a work which cannot be
less dear to us than it is even to them. This co-op-

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eration we shall give without hesitation, without
calculation, with real joy, with all the zeal of the
most ardent patriotism. jSTever have we been, and •
let us hope that we never again shall be, called upon
to repair, according to our means, more frightful
disasters, to devote our energies to a greater and
holier cause, or one more powerfully affecting our
honor and our destiny. Let this double consideration
determine the grandeur of the sacrifice we are going
to offer, the generosity of the donation we are going
to lay on the altar of our country. At such a
moment, the least concession made to the vile voice
of selfishness should press on our consciences forever
with the leaden wei'^ht of remorse, should brand our
foreheads forever with the burning stigma of infamy.
To give simply from our over-abundance, or even to
give all our over-abundance, should not suffice ; our
duty and our dignit}^ as Frenchmen require, in such
an extreme crisis as the present, that, whether our
fortune is great or little, we should sensibly diminish
it — diminish it so that we may always think with
pride on the effects of our sacrifice, as we always
point with pride to the noble scar gained in battling
for the defence and the honor of our country. In a
word, let the act of generosity that we are about to
perform, be of such a nature as to mark an era in
our existence, so that its very memory, like some
divine odor, shall be sufficient to bless, embalm and
console the rest of our days in this world.
I have spoken. ISfow then, to work 1

►

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

I

0 019 648 995 2

(

'Ihe 'price of this Pamphlet is Twenty-five Cents ^
payable to Edward Eoth, No. SS7 South Broad Street,
in behalf of the Broad Street Academy Fund, for the
Liberation of France from Foreign occupaMon, to be
collected by the pupils and other members of the School,
and transmitted directly to M. Thiers, President of the
French Bepid)lic.